The inventive concepts relate to methods of operating a memory controller and semiconductor storage devices including the memory controller, and more particularly, to memory controllers, which control performance levels of the memory controllers by taking into account the memory controllers' lifetimes, and/or semiconductor storage devices including the memory controllers.
With the advent of the information-oriented society, the amount of data which each individual person desires to store and transfer has explosively increased. Due to an increase in demand for such a high-capacity data storage medium, various types of personal data storage devices have been developed.
Among semiconductor storage devices, hard disk drives (HDDs) have been widely used due to their advantages, such as high recording density, high data transmission rates, fast data access times, and low price. However, because HDDs have a relatively complex structure including, for example, mechanical parts, the HDDs are vulnerable to issues caused by an external impact and/or a vibration.
Recently, solid state disks (SSDs) using flash memories have been developed as data storage devices for replacing the HDDs. Unlike HDDs, SSDs do not include mechanical parts. Accordingly, SSDs may reduce latency and other mechanical driving times associated with HDDs, and thus, perform relatively high speed read and write operations. Also, SSDs may improve the reliability of read and write operations because errors occurring due to latency and mechanical friction can be reduced. Further, because of relatively low heat and/or relatively low noises while operating SDDs and a relatively high resistance to an external impact of SDDs, SDDs are generally regarded as data storage devices suitable for mobile devices, compared to HDDs, and are being actively studied to improve the reliability and operation speeds of semiconductor storage devices.